Greatest St Totts Day Ever

Welcome, my fellow Gunners, to another year in which we faithful worshippers have been privileged to celebrate our favourite Saint’s Day.

And why is St Totteringham’s Day our favourite holy occasion?

Well, I believe it’s because it combines all the qualities of the other, lesser, Saints’ Days that we mark throughout the year.

It has the wonderful drunkenness associated with St Patrick’s Day; the love (for our team, our club and each other) that St Valentine is famous for and the unapologetic pride of St George’s Day. Best of all, there’s a big dose of St Schadenfreude’s Day, the occasion on which it is acceptable (indeed, obligatory) to laugh at the afflicted.

St Totteringham’s Day bundles all those marvelous feelings into one – and you have to say, this has surely been the best St T’s Day ever.

Lasagna-gate in 2006 was fun, but that season the Spuds were behind us most of the way and only really closed the gap right at the end.

This year, of course, was different. This year they opened up a 12 point lead over us and that tribe of pox-eaten donkey pizzles who call themselves their supporters kept telling us to “Mind the Gap.”

Oh we minded it alright, you fool-born codpiece-sniffers. We minded it right up the Seven Sisters Road and shoved it up your collective jaxey. How d’you like that gap?

In years to come, happy Gooners will sit around reminiscing about the 2011-2012 season.

This season has put us fans through the wringer, but it has not lacked for drama. And at the end of it all, the table does not lie. The team that finishes third deserves to be third.

Just pause for a second and consider that.

We finished third. After our worst start to a season for half a century.

We lost our talismanic captain late in the transfer window, followed quickly out the door by a fat greedy Frenchman. Our most creative player suffered a season-long injury. We started terribly and lost 8-2 at Old Toilet. Our new signings were all scooped up in a special edition of Supermarket Sweep (Yossi Benayoun came free with a packet of Daz).

We were as far up Smelly Creek (it flows into Tottenham Beck) as we had ever been in living memory and we didn’t have a paddle or even a boat. We were swimming up Smelly Creek. Without armbands.

And at that time do you know what smelled worse that the River of Runny Stuff? It was the attitude of the haters, those so-called Arsenal supporters who relished every mishap and calamity; who rejoiced in disaster because it meant they could say “told you so” about their campaign to oust the most successful manager in our club’s history.

How many times did they tell us that we would be lucky to finish in the top half of the table? Or that we would face a relegation fight?

Their attitude, just like the quality of their “support”, stank the place out and contributed to a mood of infighting and fractiousness that only made the problems worse.

But through it all Arsène Wenger kept working.

Recovering from that disastrous start and securing third place is undoubtedly one of his most impressive achievements. It proves as a lie the haters’ contention that he could never get his team playing well again, but I suppose the haters will move their goalposts to continue slaughtering him.

By the way, I have no problem with people criticising the manager or his decisions – I just have a problem with the ones who have become so obsessed with their opposition to him that they want Arsenal to fail. That’s like noticing that your brickwork needs repointing – and deciding it would be for the best if the house burnt down.

Anyway, enough, enough.

I am so proud of our team and our Club. I’m proud of every player and I’m proud of Arsene and I’m proud of Pat Rice and I’m proud of the fans (most of them, anyway).

Of course there’s work to be done to make us better next season. Quite a lot, in fact, but we have put ourselves in the best possible position to do it. What exactly should be done is something we can discuss in the days and weeks ahead.

Officially this should be a match report – and there is plenty to talk about from yesterday’s game. But right now I have no inclination to pick holes, talk about defensive frailties, questions Arsene’s team selections and substitutions.

We had a simple job to do – go to West Brom and win. We did it. We didn’t do it as comfortably as most of us would have liked but we did it all the same.

I will however, give some player ratings:

Szczesny: 10

Jenkinson: 10

Koscielny: 10

Vermaelen: 10

Santos: 10

Coquelin: 10

Song: 10

Rosicky: 10

Gervinho: 10

Van Persie: 10

Benayoun: 11 (joint MoTM)

Fulop: 11 (joint MoTM)

Subs

Walcott: 10

Ramsey: 10

Gibbs: 11 (joint MoTM)

Finally, a question: What do T*ttenham H*tspurs have in common with Hank Marvin?

Answer: Always in the Shadows.

And what grows in the shadows? You got it: fungus – stinky, weirdo fungus… the stuff God came up with as an experiment before he perfected plants and animals.

What a bunch of losers you are.
May have had a bad season (although FA Cup and poss CL), but you are cock a hoop that you finished above Spurs instead of accepting the fact that you haven’t won sod all for 7 years.

Oooh Mike – sour grapes there mate. Finishing above spuds is always a celebration and claiming the ‘third spot trophy’ is worth a lot more than either the FA or Carling cup and gives us something to build on.

Good for you Mike, we’ve been in the Champions Lge final too, it doesn’t mean you’re going to win it though and guess what, if you don’t win it you’re not in the competition next season …….. and we are ;)

What a great great article. Nows the time for all you supporters who abused wenger abused the team abused the board to come back into The Arsenal fold remember what our club motto is Victoria Concordia Cresit-….Victory Through Harmony….AND A HAPPY ST. TOTTERINGS DAY TO YOU ALL.

Mike Hunt
Just how many would you have won, if every club in the league would have had a sugar daddy spend £500 million on them ?.
You`ve won nothing within your means ,you`ve ( actually, not you or your mates who cant fill a stadium for a CL semi ) bought some trophy`s in your 8 year history!. :)

RA – the problem this morning was that some of Rocky’s colourful description of life in the N17 swamp didn’t pass the NewsNow nice language test and so I had to change a few things but as we’d already published we had to publish again to get the article picked up by NewsNow.

Now you lovely people, if we’re going to keep the blog going until our boys don the red and white again we are going to have to have things to start the chat off each day, so put your thinking caps on please and write up any thoughts for new posts.

Can i make a suggestion, no one read Arsenal Truth blog today, it does not have the right tone. Mind you it never has the right tone sometimes like this article pointed out some Arsenal ‘Fans’ only want bad things for the club. Well for now thats me done going to try and take advantage of a bit nicer weather were i am and get some gardening done.
and once again happy St.Tottering’s Day

Rocky, Rocky, Corky, yet another example of your creatively fecund imaginative despoiling of those poor wretches known as the swamp dwelling, neolithic nose pickers who inhabit the swamps of N17!

Classic!

To be fair, I think that the Swampies, in trying to traduce us, were just doing their mealy-mouthed best to boost their flagging morale, while their season was coming to its usual crepuscular conclusion, and to that extent they deserve our pity!

In contrast, the ersatz Arsenal supporters who were sharpening their crayons in readiness to crassly slander Arsene, when we were losing 1:2, deserve only our utter opprobrium for their continuing odious behaviour.

They have gone quiet for the mo’, but they will be back, and in the meantime they will soon start picking the bones out of individual players in order to indirectly criticise Arsene for having the temerity to play them, or include them in the squad!

OK, 3rd is not as good as winning the Premiership, but given our limited resources and the calamitous pre-season disloyalty that initially engulfed us, and which in turn resulted in a dreadful start to the season, as well as the contiguous, unforeseen loss of so many defenders, (all of which you have referred to) that final position is the equivalent of having scaled a footie Everest!!

Glic, you made me my taxi – now missed my appointment, so got to put up with an ‘emergency’ 7 a.m. appt tomorrow! [I’m not the emergency – it’s their let’s make him sorry for messing us about stategy!
And it really was not you who made me late either — but I had to blame someone.They may not have necessarily believed I was giving ‘advice’ to an award winning comedian in Cornwall! :roll:

Mike doesn’t sound very happy. If they don’t beat Bayern the y will be in the channel 5 cup and another new manager next season. You should concentrate on your own team mate. Happy saint tots everyone :)

Related to Mike. The new champions in manchester. And the europa league bound chelskie will also be totally screwed if financial fair play rules come into effect. It will be fun to watch, and Arsene will be smiling. :-)

You are far too kind to me, which reminds me, I need to email in an article I’ve written for AA….I’ll do that tonight if I get chance (in between putting up a tie-rack and building a shoe cabinet…yawn)..

Should be interesting, hold the back page special, ten PM tonight Sky sports one, Woolnough, Winter,Custis and Dunn. Humble pie time me thinks
G Neville Signs four year contract for FA as Hodgekinsons assistant, like the sound of that

Hi dandan, I’m beginning to get quite optimistic about the England management situation. Hodgson has the experience and knows how to make teams hard to score against and Neville has shown what a clever analyst he is in his appearances on Sky. Although I’m a club before country man, I do feel England are in safe hands for the first time since Bobby Robson.

GM, you just have to know how to set up the secondary click. Or if you can’t be bothered to do that hold down the Option key. But preferences, mouse, secondary click it’s setup, the mouse can distinguish between left/right clicks without having a separate button.

I had an idea to write a post about us being the Top Team in London but when I did a comparison of all the London teams results it turned out that the swamp dwellers came out top in the head to head :oops: Binned that one ;)

As a positive spin on it, what if his meeting with Arsene and Ivan isn’t about money….what if it’s about who will be signed? I think Pod was first step, I think M’Villa or similar will be next step. But also I’m thinking we need proven PL players so here is my list of players that could do the job immediately.

Hi GiE, he said during the interview a while ago, he would have a bakkie koffie with Arsene and Gazidis at the end of the season to talk about his future, and that is exactly what is happening. Informal, at Wenger’s home. And I think you are absolutely right – it is likely to be about more than money alone. To me it looks like a good sign as it is consistent with what he has been saying all along.

Morning all.
If I was to give my real thoughts on here I would most probably be told to feck off and post on LG.
I am concerned about several things at the club but quite frankly though some may agree most will not.
It’s not about a devine right that we should win trophies, it is not about Wenger “being the blind professor” and it’s not entirely about the club seemingly want to have financial security at all costs, or that it appears that the recession is coming back with a vengence in all of Europe and we have to keep selling our star players to balance the books.
Randy lerner has a net worth of about half of Stan kroenke and look what has happened to Villa. Ultimately Lerner pulls the strings so after the horse has bolted he has decided to sack macleish.
Now henry at liverpool is a different kettle of fish. he ordered Dagleish to fly over to Boston yesterday which was not was agreed earlier.He is a no nonsense owner and i fully expect Dagleish to be removed.
Are American owners or in our case really beneficial to to the progress of our club. How often has kroenke actually attended a game.One or two of you will say he delegates others such as laws and gazidis to deal with all matters.Anyway I might just give my real thoughts later about RVP,, CL and the squad in general. .

Kelsey,
Nothing you say could be that bad (I told everyone here last summer AW should stand down and lived!).
I happen to think the board will sell Robin, but who knows.
Come on :-)
How bad could it be? Oh god, Terry as player/manager :-(

I will write a post later on this week .Have you changed your e mail address but anyway would you kindly e mail me as I want to ask you something non football related.peaches or Rasp has it if you haven’t.

Going back to my thoughts.our 4 last captains have now said “Iwill always be a gooner or words to that effect”

Kelsey,
My email is the same, but I’ll ask Peaches for yours.
You talk a lot about American owners, so perhaps you hint at a change of ownership. Strangely, I have been wondering to myself exactly what is meant by “buying the title”, and I think this may be related.

Aha, so I am not the only one to be impressed with Gary Neville
‘England manager Roy Hodgson has heaped praise on his new recruit Gary Neville, admitting his role as a media pundit played a big part in his selecti’

Kelsey as DD said yesterday holding a point of view is one thing….hoping that things go horribly wrong for the sake of being able to say ITYS is another. You are in the first camp, as anyone reading your comments over the last few weeks as we limped over the line can see you supporting the team and manager. That is the most important thing isn’t it? Having a view on the ownership or boardroom shenanigans is just fluff when it all boils down.

I guess it depends how you view Kroenkes ownership, is he a profiteer, is he a football lover, is he a tool of the board being used to prevent Usmanov, is he to be viewed like a Institutional Investor of PLCs?

Whether he attends matches is irrelevant (for me) if he does best by the club. Ask City fans whether they care that Mansour doesn’t attend matches. Didn’t even show up on their most important match for 44 years. Obviously the question is is he doing best by the club or has he got the right men in place? Henry obviously felt Comoli was not so he removed him, for what it’s worth any club that gets Comoli will do well.

We have been owned by traditional owners (board members and a few small holders) for quite some time, longer than any other top club, we are still getting used to it and working out how it affects us. I think I hope that we continue as we have been, the recessionary effects on us should be reduced now we are not reliant on property sales so it’s whether the board follow through with promises of investment now after years of prudence.

Evonne, having joined the England set up I wonder how much Woy will have read his autobiography where Gary Neville said this:
“I don’t see us competing seriously for a major tournament for at least 10 years,” & “There have been times when I’ve reflected on my international career and just thought: ‘Well that was a massive waste of time.'”

I think Neville is a good choice, he reduces the age gap between Manager, Coach and Players, the younger members of the squad will not question his ability or knowledge as they know what he has achieved. His Sky analysis has shown him to be a good thinker of the game but first and foremost a fan of football, his commentary on the Milan second leg summed him up, imploring Ox to run at his man and make hay because he could see they were scared of him.

The more worrying question is is time up for him on Sky, he has been the best pundit for years and has not bought into sensationalism, it’ll be a crying shame if we have to back to Jamie “tight trousers” Redknapp

morning … well when i say morning i mean late afternoonn… actually when i say late afternoon i mean evening. Evening peaches.
Anyway just got back from work must get a move on soon to get ready for 5 a side with some mates when i say mates i mean….